"It is clear that Air Passenger Duty is just another way for the taxman to squeeze every penny out of hard-pressed families," commented John O'Connell, chief executive of the TPA. "We are calling on the Government to give Brits a break and scrap this unfair tax once and for all."

Tim Alderslade, chief executive of airline trade body Airlines UK, expressed concern about how well British businesses will be able to compete after Brexit if APD remains in place.

"The Treasury should be upfront about why this levy has been allowed to rise to its current level when competitor countries are busy cutting or abolishing their respective aviation taxes," he said.

"With Brexit still to happen it also sends a terrible signal about the UK being open to the world – companies wanting to strike deals and venture to new markets overseas will be unable to do so if routes out of UK airports are unviable owing to our increasingly uncompetitive tax regime."

Shopping made up most of the total, coming in at £2.1bn. The TPA calculated that Brits would spend an average of £238.75 each on purchases for their getaways, £47.75 of the total being VAT. The representative basket of goods likely to be purchased before departure included flip flops, sun cream and a sarong.